About Our Fabric Production Process
March 2008 New and Improved Process
We are proud to announce a new and improved production process. Our fabric is now printed with archival, UltraChrome K3 Inks making stoles and other fabrics easier to care for. Though I wouldn't treat them like some old T-shirt, stoles can now be hand washed in cold water, without fading. (The "remember your first washing your blue jeans" caution is now GONE.)
This is a professional photo printer, the Epson 7880, that will print huge panoramas. In this case we are creating our own fabric prints. More about the stoles is here: http://www.artfromthesoul.com/Banners.html
This printer offers superior smoothness in printing and superior saturation and coverage.
The paper/fabric is indeed special too. It is paper backed cotton broadcloth (coated for brilliance as of Spring 2010). You just print and then pull the paper off and there is your fabric. (Of course you have to create the artwork first!) Lots of research and investment went into getting to this point in my production process along with special gear including a LaCie 321 monitor with a calorimeter and professional printer/monitor color matching done via a spectrometer. Not recommended for the faint of heart.
You can see from the height of the desk that this is a big girl too. Extra care is taken with it and it has its own dedicated UPS with line filter for clean power without glitches from the local power company.
One of the things we have discovered is that even with the most sophisticated equipment that the fabric we print on must be pristine. There cannot be a bump in the fabric nor can a thread be out of place. A single raised thread or even a loose thread is a nightmare so with each piece of fabric we inspect it, brush it, clip threads and then inspect it twice more.
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Here are some production details if you are interested:
I just assumed that people knew that we printed our own fabric. Yep, we do it right here in the studio. The artwork comes first and it is created to fit onto the stoles or item we are creating. We use Jacquard printable cotton broadcloth which is paper backed so that it can be cut to fit into the printer. It comes in rolls 50' long by 56" wide. Jacquard coats the fabric, which is new as of 2010, to better accept the ink for richer, truer colors. Getting from the computer screen, which is where the art is created in Adobe Photoshop, to the printed product is not an easy process as what you see on the screen is not exactly what you get out of the printer, color matching wise. Our monitor and is calibrated and we have professional color profiles but even that isn't enough. We do now have a formula for adjusting the color but it took a while to get there.
And with printing on fabric there are all sorts of variables that are introduced:
* Any stray thread can act like a brush and drag ink across your print. We clip all the thread before printing.
* Any stray lint will accept ink and then fall off the fabric leaving a white spot. We brush the fabric and inspect it at least three times for lint. (You usually cannot use a lint roller as it raises more lint and threads off the fabric.)
* Without the proper suction, the fabric lifts up from the print head and drags ink into unwanted areas
* The fabric initially curls with wet ink
* One must discover the proper weight to hang off the end of the fabric, as it is coming out of the printer, to compensate for the curling due to the saturation of the ink. That weight is a sheet of paper the width of whatever you are printing.
* You must allow for adequate drying time to be able to cut and sew the fabric.
* We use K3 Archival inks so the fabric can be gently rinsed in cold water.
Custom stoles rolling off the presses for a community choir, Sine Nomine, in Colorado.
Art from the Soul TM
